Anna Hazare to begin 18 month tour from January

Ralegan Siddhi: Veteran social crusader Anna Hazare will launch an 18 month nationwide tour for a citizens' movement against corruption from January 2013, an aide said on Thursday. "It was originally scheduled to kick off from Diwali. However, on account of Hazare's cataract operation last week, it had to be postponed by a couple of months," the aide, declining to be identified, said.

The rescheduled tour will be taken up from Patna's Gandhi Maidan as planned from January. The exact date will be announced later. In the next couple of days, Hazare, 75, is expected to meet his core advisers and experts to review and react on former associate Arvind Kejriwal's charges against Bharatiya Janata Party chief Nitin Gadkari on Wednesday. "Hazare will discuss the entire issue with his colleagues and supporters and is likely to come out with his statement (on the allegations against Gadkari) after a couple of days," the aide said.

Briefly interacting with the media after his medical check-up in Pune on Wednesday, Hazare declared that he would strive for a nationwide organisation, comprising citizens, activists, students and others working against corruption, during his one-and-a-half year tour in the run-up to the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. "I shall reach out many crores of Indians during the nationwide tour and build up public pressure on the government to enact the Jan Lokpal legislation and other similar laws for good governance. The organisations of activists will carry forward the work of creating that public awareness on these issues. The time for change has come," he remarked.

The rescheduled tour will be taken up from Patna's Gandhi Maidan as planned from January.

Hazare claimed that thousands of anti-corruption activists, including youth, retired government servants, ex-servicemen and others have sent letters expressing their willingness to join his proposed organisation and fight corruption from the taluka to the national levels.